NAIROBI, Kenya (LifeSiteNews) — Cardinal Robert Sarah, former prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Sacraments, said he is “very proud” that the African bishops have “completely” rejected the controversial Vatican document Fiducia Supplicans that proposes the priestly blessing of couples in irregular situations and same-sex couples.
“I think Fiducia Supplicans has a response from the African Bishops – very clear,” Sarah said. Emphasizing that the document lacks any foundation in Scripture, he continued, “And not only the African bishops but many in Europe, in Kazakhstan, in Poland, refused, because the document has no scriptural basis, no theological basis.”
“I was very proud to hear the African bishops rejecting completely this text. And many other bishops even in Brazil refused, so I think it seemed to me impossible to accept,” he concluded.
Sarah made the remarks on February 23 at the Catholic University of East Africa in Nairobi as part of a Q&A for a theological symposium. This conference, organized by the dogmatic department, aimed to shed light on the missionary mandate of Christ in the religious, cultural, and social context of Africa today. Sarah, a stalwart defender of Catholic orthodoxy in both teaching and sacramental discipline, was the keynote speaker.
READ: Cardinal Sarah to address theological symposium on spreading the Gospel in Africa
The Symposium attracted at least 700 participants over the course of the two days, many drawn from across East Africa by the presence of Cardinal Sarah as well as the Archbishops of Nairobi and Kisumu.
LifeSiteNews was told by its African correspondent Tobias Nauruki that the students, professionals, the archbishop who was present, youth, and men and women who were present from diverse countries applauded the cardinal. Nauruki said the question came directly from those present in an attempt to find answers regarding the confusion in the Church since Pope Francis announced the blessing of same-sex “unions,” and that the conference attendees were keen to get answers and find the truth from Cardinal Sarah.
Notably, in early January, in a lengthy statement published by veteran Vatican journalist Sandro Magister, Sarah joined his voice to those of his fellow African bishops in rejecting Fiducia Supplicans’ endorsement of same-sex “blessings.”
READ: Cardinal Sarah strongly rejects Fiducia Supplicans, ‘heresy’ of same-sex ‘blessings’
In his January statement, Sarah allied himself with the African bishops and bishops’ conferences that had made known their rejection of Fiducia Supplicans.
He called for more bishops to make similar statements and thanked the “Episcopal Conferences which have already done this work of truth, in particular those of Cameroon, Chad, Nigeria, etc., whose decisions and firm opposition to the Declaration ‘Fiducia Supplicans’ I share and make my own.”
Such opposition to Fiducia Supplicans is not an opposition to Pope Francis, he explained, but instead is a move “firmly and radically opposing a heresy that seriously undermines the Church, the Body of Christ, because it is contrary to the Catholic faith and Tradition.”
READ: Pope Francis backs down, permits African bishops to ban blessings of homosexual ‘couples’
Just a week ago, Cardinal Gerhard Müller declared that Church leaders and the Catholic faithful must reject “blessings” for homosexual “couples” endorsed by Pope Francis in Fiducia Supplicans because they contradict Catholic teaching and “lead to heresy.”
“Fiducia Supplicans must be considered doctrinally problematic, for it contains a denial of Catholic doctrine,” he wrote in a February 16 essay for First Things, criticizing the “grave defects” of the document that Pope Francis approved in December. “For this reason, it is also problematic from a pastoral point of view.”
READ: Cardinal Müller: Fiducia Supplicans ‘leads to heresy,’ Catholics cannot accept it